Having a galbi dinner with some of the members of the International Artist Collective after a critique at the Myeongdong Gallery. It has been really great to find friends who are also interested in advancing their artistic careers.
This is the painting that i produced for "the Seoul Drum Festival", featuring the Uni-fi drum group and Affrican drummers. I painted live on stage with other artists while the musicians performed. It was pretty great. I also participated in another live sketch this past weekend in Hongdae park. It was a bit less formal, but way more fun. I think that getting out into the open and really just going for it is the best way for me to push forward my intuition as an artists and painter. It's something I'm going to try and continue to work on.
This is a view of the Olympic park lake with the changing leaves reflected in the water. i really do love my new neighbourhood. It's nice to have a bit of nature near by in this big city. The park itself is a little bit of peace from the hecktic pace and grey of the city scape. 
I recently participated in the 'Yongsan International Art Exhibition' in Noksapyeong along with several other members of the I.A.C. This was the opening reception dinner. It was a real nod to all the pomp that Korea loves to give events without any real cause or meaning behind it. Angie and I, along with most of the other foreign artists were slightly bewildered by the entire event. But the food was great and i won a door prize of a new watercolour set :)
Me posing beside my two photographs "Art in the Street", 2010. The work done by the collective was generally WAY stronger in terms of conceptual and contemporary relevance campared with most of the work produced by the Korean artists. It was hard to believe that there could be so many flower paintings and landscapes done in a classical style.... too many. * * *
October has come and nearly gone. Time seems to have spead up even more since school began and I can hardly believ that next week is Halloween and midterm already!!! My time in seoul has been undergoing some changes in the past weeks. It's only natural that after being here for a year, my perspective on the city as well as my understanding of Korea and it's culture should reflect that time spent. sometimes I often feel that i should know a LOT more than i do, but however i can't feel totally amiss because i have acheived a lot since being here and I do feel that I have come to find a degree of balance and acceptance with living in this strange strange country. Life as a public school teacher in this country certainly comes with it's challenges, but I have also been enjoying all of the conveniences that living in such a large metropolitain city affords more and more. Especially since the quality of help from my co-teachers has improved so dramatically. I have to make sure not to fall into a rut at school. I need to challenge myself to be a better more focused teacher. I also need to challenge myself to look for a better job that will bring my career forward. Because there aint no way I am doing a year 3 at Garak elementary school.
While school has generally improved, my social life has been a bit more difficult recently. maybe it's just homesickness, but it's been a bit lonely here recently. My break up with James in September forced me to re-visit not only my goals and expectations about being here but also the necessity of making new aquaintances and not relying on this to remain too stable here. I sometime forget that we are all nomads here, drawn by the security of a steady paycheck and the oportunity of constant adventure, yet we are all essentially alone and unrooted from our known surroundings. People will come and go and come and go and leave to different places, at different times, for different purposes. So change is inevitable and yet it is also really important not to let myself fall into habit, routine and bordome which doesn't take advantage of living in Korea and the possibility of meeting new interesting friends.
I think it was Sunim who told me that we are essentially the same person with the same problems no mater where we go. Place is an illusion, only ones present situation is real. It's still hard not to get caught up in the routine of a 9-5 exhistance and forget to sit up look around and think "HEY! I'm in Korea!". And so, my greatest ambition in my second year in Korea is and will continue to be to sit up every day and take advantage of my situation here and to be more involved in being in Korea. Now I feel like a broken record, because I know I've said this before so maybe what I'm looking for is more the strength to do what I know is right and best for myself and my life in Korea.
Well as you can tell, I have been trying to bring a certain amount of focus back to my artwork in the past little while and not forget my reasons for having come to Seoul in the first place.
And in that respect I feel as though I have been making a concentrated effort and gaining momentum. My hope now is to keep the ball rolling so to speak and to try and have fun in the process of doing so.
